Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

[username1]

Does anybody know if once you quit drinking alcohol if your blood sugar levels go up? I gave up "real beer" on Oct. 7th and have been drinking non-alcohol beer since. I know alcohol and sugar are tied together so I was wondering if my levels have gone up because of that?

I had a blood test done on Friday to check on my liver which came out fine but, he said my sugar was way too high and started talking about diabetes and insulin shots, I've never had a problem with my sugar before while I was drinking. Do you think it could be since I just quit drinking the amount of alcohol I was for so many years all of a sudden just a few weeks ago which is messing with my system?

I guess I should have just asked my doctor if that's what it was since he knows I was drinking before. I'll go in and see him again this week for my sleeping medication so I'll ask him if that could be it, he said for now to eat better and exercise and to see him in 3 months and he'll do more tests to see where I'm at.

[username1]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

I'm searching on google and seeing that alcohol lowers blood sugar levels, so if my body has been used to lowering blood sugar through alcohol for so many years, and then I quit drinking that amount of alcohol every night, is it really possible that it's due to not drinking the same amount all of a sudden that my blood sugar levels shot-up and that it might balance out again after a while? Since he was pretty alarmed at how much it was, he said it was 270. I don't really know much about diabetes but, my grandma and my mom has it and my mom checks her blood regularly and yesterday hers was 180 and was kind of shocked.

[Wagoneer]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

Have you been eating alot of carbs/sugars since you quit? I know when I stopped drinking before I wanted to eat my weght in chocolate! I wish I could give you a better answer. Lots of smarties here on the boards - I'm sure someone will know. Best of luck

[username1]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

not necessarily since i stopped but even before then probably in the last 6 months i've been regularly buying chocolates, eating chocolate cookies and ice cream. i'm going to stop all those now.

[Bruunhilde]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

First of all, User, congrats on just STOPPING the beer, amazing.

Second, maybe you should bring in a label from the alcohol-free beer and check it out with your Dr. Maybe it has something in it that raises blood sugar.

My blood sugar is higher on alcohol and lower off of it, so long as I am not eating starch/bread/sugar. You might want to try low-carb which would preclude the non-alcohol beer possibly too unfortunately.

I am due for blood tests and thats something they need to check with me. However, I'm on and off again with the alcohol so I am waiting for a period of abstinence so I can test that. If I get anything out of it, I will share. My blood sugar (fasting) was 95 drinking. I was hoping it would go DOWN after stopping all the alcohol since alcohol is sugar too. Ugh.

[Lavande]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

Hi username1,

Congrats on your AF time.

Here's what I found:
Carbs and GI Information - Carbs in Food - Glycemic Index GI Advice
Glycemic Load GL of Food Servings - Carbohydrates Guide - GI Diet Advice - Low GI Diet


Carbs and Fiber in Non-Alcoholic Beer
Food Item: Non-Alcoholic Beer
Food Quantity: 12 fl oz
Carbs: 16g
Dietary Fiber: 0g
Net Carbs: 16g

If my fasting blood sugar was as highas yours I would cut out the Non-Alcoholic beer & a mess of other carbs too. Since your family history of diabetes is so high you should be on the lookout to be safe

Wishing you continued success!

Lav

[crimsons]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

@Username1, congrats on booting the beer! That's great. As someone else pointed out, it could well be that you may be craving more non-fiber carbs -- this means pasta, rice, breakfast cereal (even the so-called "healthy heart" ones), bread (even whole grain). There's a load of crap being unloaded by marketing offices in the processed-food industry that they add this or that to the product to make it "healthy."

My dad died of Type 2, so I'm concerned about this at age 51. I've been listening to a lot of podcasts about it as I've been exercising lately -- you might search iTunes for "insulin", as they're free. But the recommendation is generally to load up on veggies first, lean animal proteins second, and then fruit -- all of these have some carbs in them. But Lavande is right, that's a lotta carbs in the NA beer.

Diabetes, as you know, is probably worth giving up even NA beer to avoid! Maybe you can ration them out so you can still enjoy them but fewer of 'em?

[username1]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

I guess it must be the beer, I don't think it's food since I don't really eat that much. I hardly ever have breakfast, before/after cutting out "real beer". When I wake up, I just get on my laptop and will just drink water or have a small bottle of gatorade and work for a few hours eat lunch around 2pm-3pm. I eat out a lot, and it's fast food usually so it will be a combo meal at any of the usual fast food places and then my next meal used to be around 12am or 1am-2am after I used to be drunk right before I slept.

After cutting out beer, I still haven't had a day I had breakfast except for today 1 boiled egg white. The only thing is now I'm eating dinner around 7pm and not eating again, I'll have about 10 NA beers and go to sleep. I'm not eating late anymore since my sleep meds say that if I eat fatty foods around the time I take the meds it could have an effect on the meds and I really need my sleep meds to work since insomnia was one of the reasons for me to continue for so long.

I've been reading about "bitter melon" that is supposed to help diabetics lower or balance their sugar levels, so I got those pills, also read somebody on here recommend cinamon so i got cinnamon w/ chromium pills, did brief research those are also supposed to good for balance sugar levels.

I'm going to get a juicer soon, and start juicing vegetables iv'e been researching recipes for diabetics, a lot of greens is recommended as mentioned in the previous reply, and then I've started exercising every day. I guess I'll see what happens in 3 months.

[username1]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

i've changed my eating habits since my last post, it's been a little over a month. Since then I cut out NA beer but, instead I did some math and found out how much alcohol the .05% is in NA beer to the same amount compared to vodka and it comes out to about 1-2 shots per gallon of water, so I replaced the NA beer with that, I put the vodka in water and put lemons in there so I can't taste the vodka. At first when I was drinking it with plain water, I could taste the hint of vodka and it tempted me to put more in there but, I didn't i started putting lemon juice in it.

I guess it's all psychological at this point since I drink about a gallon of this over about 3 hours. I had posted about doing this in another thread and people advised against it and said it was a bad idea but, I felt like I had to because of the carbs and since I did it about a month ago, I havne't had a real beer or NA beer, and I never went over the limit of vodka, or ever had a night off and got wasted or drunk.

Along with that I started working out and exercising 7 days a week but, now it's 5 days, weekends are off since i'm not at home i'm out doing work related stuff and Im' way too tired when I get home. I lift weights 3 days a week and go on the treadmill on off days was running about a mile and a half for 30 min. now lately have been doing 35 min. 2 miles.

I only eat fast food like twice a week and try to get the healthiest option, look at nutrition info online ahead of time, have been staying away from white bread, only wheat bread if i have it and it's still limited, I bake fish every night or chicken breast, eating lots of vegetables, got that juicer I mentioned, looked juice recipes for diabetics. Started juicing 3x a day, now it's about 2x a day. staying away from foods with high carbs and sugars, no desserts, cookies etc.

I'm also working with a nutrionist now who's helping me to get healthier and fit from exercising so his nutrion and meal planning advise is going to help with that. I'm really trying to get into shape and get healthy now. Well, yesterday he told me to get a glucose meter since I wasn't testing my blood sugar yet, my dr. told me to come back in 3 months to check it said I didn't need to test it on my own, I had told him that I was creeped out by the needle etc. to do the testing so he said not to do it. He had already said he thinks I have type 2 diabetes but, come back in 3 months and will test if I don't get the sugar in control he'll start prescribing sugar pills.

My fasting blood sugar from my doctors test in october was 270. Today I got the glucose meter, I checked my blood sugar within 2 hours (about 1.5 hours) from my last meal tonight. My blood sugar came out to 84. I don't know if its' too good to be true, or what but, I'm surprised, I can't believe it. I was really freaking out over having diabetes, and I might still have it, I don't know maybe it's from changing my habits that it's just lowered now. Or if it was all the carbs and beer I was drinking at the time and had my test done during then. I'm going to continue testing and see what happens. I think it was a blessing in disquise since it really got me to want to make a lifestyle change to get healthy and in shape.

[username1]

Blood Sugar Levels Going Up After Quitting?

Well I had my 3 month blood test last week at the doctors office. I've still been exercising 5 days a week, eating healthy no fast food (occasionally), no beer. Still drinking that vodka/water thing but, now instead of 2 shots I'm down to 1 shot every evening mixed in a gallon of water. Haven't had a "real" night of drinking or getting heavily drunk yet, never more than 2 shots a night since (and now down to 1 for about a month).

My blood sugar came out to 97 fasting, which I guess isn't that bad compared to the 270 I was at 3 months ago. My doctor isn't going to put me on sugar meds anymore, I just have to continue my new changes with being healthy since I still have pre-diabetes it seems.